New car unstable in draft

The cars are unstable, and anyone who tested at Talladega last October knew that.

What happened in the test session Friday shouldn’t have been a surprise as the curved front bumpers make it much more difficult to push-draft. Dale Earnhardt Jr. turned Marcos Ambrose to start a 12-car crash on Day 2 of the test.

Jeff Burton knew it would happen. That’s why he didn’t participate in the 20-car drafting session. He knew that with the bumpers not aligning well and the tiny 53-inch-wide rear spoiler that the cars would be unstable if they got a push.

“There will be wrecks in the Daytona 500,” Burton said. “I guarantee you that. And I guarantee in the last 100 miles there will be more than in the first 400. The question is how bad are the cars going to handle? That’s just something we don’t know yet.

“Right now, they’re going to handle bad.”

NASCAR officials believe that drivers will simply decide not to push, but that’s difficult because a push can help cars get to the front. Jeff Gordon said it is tempting to push even though they shouldn’t be doing it.

“We have gotten so comfortable with running on one another’s bumpers, pushing and being able to do that,” he said. “You have to kind of reset a little bit and go back to the way we used to do it where you get close and you still gain momentum and push guys but with the air and not necessarily the bumpers.”

Earnhardt felt his Chevrolet was OK pushing a Toyota but had trouble working with Fords. But drivers in Fords don’t think it is a manufacturer thing.

Greg Biffle, in a Ford, said he tried to push the Chevrolets of Jamie McMurray and Earnhardt and the Ford of Casey Mears and once they wobbled, he lifted and they didn’t wreck.

“I guess I better not push that much because I’m going to end up wrecking somebody. … You can push delicately,” Biffle said. “I pushed (them) most of the way down the straightaway easy and I saw they were all over the place.

“I recognize that it’s hard. But you can’t just cram your foot to the floor and just shove the guy because the guy in front can’t drive it. And that’s what happened back there (Friday).”

So what’s the answer for the Daytona 500?

“There definitely is attrition (in this style),” Mark Martin lamented. “Hopefully we’ve gotten smart like we saw at Talladega and start wrecking with 10 to go.”

Biffle explains what would be smart:

“You can elect to get out of the gas and not keep going,” Biffle said. “If you’ve got a guy wobbling, you’re the one that has to make the decision what to try to do to fix it.”

RCR teams happy

Led by Burton, who posted the second-fastest single-car lap at 194.620 mph, Richard Childress Racing left Daytona quite happy as its cars were strong throughout testing. They were consistently among the fastest cars right off the truck.

“It’s encouraging,” Burton said. “I’m cautiously optimistic.”

New competition director Dr. Eric Warren had a separate testing plan for each of the four RCR cars, creating a more integrated working environment among the teams.

“You don’t want to come down here and run bad,” said Kevin Harvick. “I think there are still a lot of unknowns in getting the cars through inspection and knowing exactly what is right and what is wrong.

“It’s gone good. Everybody has done their own thing. We’ll put it all together when we get back and see where we’re at.”

Earnhardt Childress Racing engine builder Danny Lawrence was all smiles. He said RCR didn’t bring its best engines and the teams have better equipment for the Daytona 500.

“We’re definitely not in a panic mode like we have been before down here when you’ve done all you can do and you’re in the back,” Lawrence said.

Ford teams not so happy

If there was an organization that appeared behind the other manufacturers, it was Ford.

No more than two Fords were in the top 10 of single-car speeds in any of the first five sessions during the test. Biffle eventually posted the top speed at 194.936 mph but that was late in the weekend when most of the teams already had stopped testing.

With no tech and different agendas for different teams, not too much should be put into the speeds. But those who don’t appear as strong left scratching their heads.

“You can only guess what people are doing for tape and spoilers and how legal they are,” said Roush Yates Engines CEO Doug Yates. “Are we a tenth (of a second) off? Two-tenths? Three-tenths? … We’ve always wanted to come down here and have good single-car speed.

“It’s a pretty good indicator. All we can do is go back and work on our program.”

One piece of work will be to get the car in the wind tunnel. The Roush Fenway Racing cars hadn’t even been in the wind tunnel before the test.

Big excuse: We’re behind

Oh woe is me. That will be the refrain of many crews in the garage and any driver who wrecks early in the season as teams try to get 2013 cars built. The body styles are all different in order to have more manufacturer identity.

There is a shortage of decklids and hoods. Decklids are being made by only one NASCAR-approved vendor (Composite Resources) at a rate of 50 a week.

Each manufacturer has its own hood manufacturer. Crawford Composites, which made the rear wings when the car of tomorrow was introduced, is making them for Toyota; Roush Industries is making them for Ford; and Five Star Race Car Bodies is making them for Chevrolet.

Sure, teams are behind. But considering that the Daytona 500 isn’t until Feb. 24, that gives them enough time to get cars ready for the season.

“It’s a fact that there’s a lack of inventory,” NASCAR Vice President of Competition Robin Pemberton said. “We know where we’re at. It’s on everybody’s part whether it’s delivery dates on sheet metal, decklids or hoods.

“If you look on (future) delivery dates, we should be in good shape.”

Another key element: The decklids are interchangeable no matter the type of track, meaning that teams can get by with just a few decklids early in the season.

Daytona 500 field taking shape

With 35 cars testing, how many teams will show up for the Daytona 500?

Expect somewhere between 45-50. Among the drivers who didn’t test but are expected to attempt to qualify for the Daytona 500 are Michael Waltrip (for Swan Racing), David Ragan, David Gilliland, Brian Keselowski, Joe Nemechek, J.J. Yeley and Terry Labonte.

BK Racing, which had one car at the test for Travis Kvapil and David Reutimann, hopes to have two cars and possibly three at the Daytona 500 with Kvapil, Reutimann and Landon Cassill as its possible drivers.